Private Space Capsule Launch 'Mind-Blowingly Awesome'

SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket lifts off on Dec. 8, 2010, with the company's first Dragon spacecraft. Three hours and 20 minutes later, the capsule splashed down in the Pacific Ocean, marking a first for a non-governmental entity.Credit: collectSPACE/Robert Z. Pearlman Click here to view more photos.

The chief executive of SpaceX had plenty to celebrate today
(Dec. 8), after the milestone first test flight of the private spaceflight company's
unmanned Dragon space capsule.

"It's just mind-blowingly awesome," Musk said in a
news briefing after the spacecraft had returned from orbit. "It's hard to
be articulate when your mind's blown ? but in a very good way."

The accomplishment makes SpaceX the first commercial company
ever to launch and re-enter
a spacecraft from low-Earth orbit. To date, only six nations or
governmental agencies have performed such a feat: the United States, Russia,
China, Japan, India and the European Space Agency. [Photos of the Dragon spacecraft flight]

"I can't tell you how excited I am," NASA
Administrator Charles Bolden told Space
News, a SPACE.com partner, at an event at NASA headquarters in Washington today.
"The important thing for everybody to understand is that this is the first
time that something other than a nation has done ascent, on-orbit and intact
recovery."

SpaceX's successful mission is also a landmark for the
commercial spaceflight industry as a whole. It was the first test flight under
NASA's Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program, which is
designed to foster the development of private
vehicles capable of carrying cargo and crew to the International Space
Station.

SpaceX plans to use its unmanned Dragon spacecraft as the cargo truck to deliver supplies to the International Space Station under a $1.6 billion deal with NASA. That contract calls for 12 SpaceX Dragon flights to the space station through 2016. NASA has also struck a $1.9 billion deal with another company, Orbital Sciences of Virginia, for eight cargo flights using its private spacecraft and rockets.

"What a great day for SpaceX, what a great day for
NASA, and what a historic day for commercial spaceflight," said Alan
Lindenmoyer, program manager of NASA's Commercial Crew and Cargo Program.
"This is an indication that this experiment is working. This
public-private partnership has certainly shown to be successful today."

The capsule made two orbits of the Earth at speeds
greater than 17,000 mph (over 27,300 kilometers per hour), according to SpaceX
officials. It then re-entered the Earth's atmosphere and splashed down in the
Pacific Ocean shortly after 2 p.m. EST (1900 GMT). The entire mission lasted almost
3 hours and 20 minutes.

"This has really been better than I expected,"
Musk said. "Just looking at all the mission data ? it's almost too good.
For a rocket to work, and a spacecraft to work ? they're both incredibly
complex devices. So much can go wrong but, it all went right. I'm sort of in
semi-shock."

The smooth operation of this demonstration flight could
help Musk, and other potential commercial providers, quiet some of the critics
of commercial spaceflight. After today's success, Musk said that doubting the
capability of the private space industry "wouldn't make sense. It would be
like fighting on the wrong side of yesterday's war."

Yet amid the celebration, SpaceX already has its eye on the
next round of test flights in the COTS program. ?

"In our schedules with NASA, it said that if this
flight went well, it would allow us to go straight to the space station in the
next one," Musk said. "We have to carefully examine the data from
this mission, but I'm optimistic that the next flight will be to the space
station."

"We're beyond the 'if' for 'if it's possible,'"
said Gwynne Shotwell, president of SpaceX. "Now we can move forward and
get stuff done."